The Berlin Hauptbahnhof; where a bomb disposal crew recently defused a petrol bomb apparently left by left-wing extremists, an attack eerily similar to the attacks by the Red Army Faction / Baader-Meinhof Gang 40 years ago.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011 – Berlin. The discovery and defusing of a bomb planted in Berlin’s main train station yesterday, the third bomb in a row created apparently by left-wing extremists, unexpectedly sent shivers down my spine. A leftist group called “Hekla Reception Committee — Initiative for more Eruptions in Society ” has claimed responsibility, saying the bombs are in response to Germany’s role in the Afghanistan war and as an arms exporter (the name is a reference to the Icelandic volcano that caused so much havoc on European travel recently.

Having studied Red Army Faction/Baader-Meinhof Gang for 15 years, I am well acquainted with the desire to compare every single bombing or terrorist act to those committed during Germany’s own “War on Terror” in the 1970s. It’s a somewhat natural instinct, but it inevitably is a non-illuminative task; the differences are often more profound than the similarities yet it become very easy to ignore those differences and focus exclusively on the parallels.

Welcome to the revamped version of baader-meinhof.com. Created way back in 1997, this site has now undergone 4 distinct versions. What’s new about this version of the site? Nothing… at least in terms of content. I basically redid the entire site as a wordpress CMS-based site, which will allow for much easier editing, more robust communities, a cleaner interface, and more. By the end of October I should have fully brought over all of the content from the old site and and have all of the new elements on the site fully functional. If something looks missing, check back soon! And in the meantime, if you still want to see the old site, you can find it here.

In the early 1970s, the automaker BMW’s brand was symbiotically linked to left-wing terrorism in the company’s native West Germany. BMW/Brand Terror explores how BMW came to be connected to terror.

BMWs became so strongly associated with terrorism that a common joke emerged among Germans: “BMW” didn’t stand for “Bavarian Motor Works” but instead stood for “Baader-Meinhof Wagen” after the notorious Baader-Meinhof Gang that was waging war against the German state.

Police would regularly set up roadblocks and simply pull over just BMWs, certain in their belief that the terrorist group only preferred the sporty cars from the Bavarian automaker. As Der Spiegel magazine noted, BMW owners had a very tough time in the early seventies, because quite simply they were ALL under suspicion.

BMW/Brand Terror was created by baader-meinhof.com creator Richard Huffman for his site’s visitors to enjoy.